Loyal
to his original plan for a series
of adventure films Lucas started
working on Indy's next outing
in early 1985. Despite earlier
announcements from his own company,
that there would be a total
of five Indy films, it was decided
that this third one would be
pulling the curtain on the adventure
serials of the past. With the
negative reviews of the previous
film still echoing in his ears
Lucas thought it would be better
for Indy to return to the light
spirit of Raiders.
The initial deal of making three
films, along with the bittersweet
taste Temple
of Doom had left, made
no questions about Spielberg's
involvement in the next chapter
of the adventurous saga. He
felt bad about making such a
dark film as Temple
of Doom and wanted to
make up for the audience. Besides
he felt obliged to Lucas, as
a friend, to complete the project
that started some years ago
in that Hawaiian beach.

An early idea
involved a ghost story, with
children and a haunted house
but it was soon dropped because
it reminded Temple
of Doom a lot. Another
idea based on a quest for the
Holy Grail was explored for
a while but was soon abandoned,
too. Spielberg didn't like the
concept of a modern day quest
for the Holy Grail because he
had always associated it with
Monty
Python and he couldn't
really relate it to any present
day myth. "The Grail legend
was interesting to me symbolically
because it represented the search
for one's self - but making
a movie about that seemed too
esoteric for this genre."

Even George Lucas,
who had proposed the Holy Grail
storyline, grappled with the
problem of developing an action
tale around what was essentially
a mythological object. "The
Ark of the Covenant was supposedly
a real artifact," Lucas
observed, "whereas the
Holy Grail, or at least the
story surrounding it, is more
of a myth. The Grail was the
cup that Christ drank from at
the Last Supper and was then
used to catch his blood and
that was probably a real object.
But the Arthur legend that came
out of that was completely mythological.
As a result, my initial ideas
were very metaphysical and the
Grail was difficult to define."

The adaptation
of a Chinese legend involving
the Monkey King in Africa impressed
Lucas so much as in early May
1985 he talked with scriptwriter
Chris Columbus and producer
Robert Watts. Lucas, with Frank
Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy
even flew to Africa for location
scouting. Columbus scriptwriting
credits included The
Goonies, Young
Sherlock Holmes and Gremlins,
films that Spielberg had developed
as producer. "What attracted
me to doing Indiana Jones is
that he may very well be the
greatest American hero of the
20th century," stated Columbus.
"To write this film is
a bigger challenge than writing
Sherlock Holmes. I'm going about
it the same way I did Holmes.
I'm determined to write the
best Indiana Jones movie that
anyone has ever seen. I've no
idea what the story will be,
but I know it certainly will
be different that the last two."
Unfortunately, the screenplay
he wrote during that summer
failed to please either Lucas
or Spielberg. After several
drafts, however, both Lucas
and Spielberg decided it was
not the story they wanted to
tell. "Chris writes comedy
brilliantly and his script was
very humorous," Spielberg
recalled. "It was upbeat
and full of the same nostalgia
that we tapped into in Raiders
of the Lost Ark, so in
that sense Chris was right on
the money. But I don't think
any of us wanted to go to Africa
for four months and try to get
Indy to ride a rhinoceros in
a multi-vehicular chase, which
was one of the sequences Chris
had written. Once ? got into
the script, I began to feel
very old, too old to direct
it, anyway."

Spielberg, Ford &
Lucas

By the time Columbus'
script was placed on the shelf,
Lucas had developed several
new ideas to bring the Holy
Grail myth down to earth, particularly
the notion that drinking from
the authentic Grail would insure
immortality, while a sip from
the wrong one would age the
partaker into dust. The Nazis
again would be after the Grail.
Though intrigued by these developments,
Spielberg still pressed for
more. Somewhere at this point
a new idea was born: "Why
don't we give Indy a father?"
Coincidentally, Ford, Lucas
and Spielberg had recently become
fathers. "I did not want
Indy on a headlong pursuit without
a subplot that was almost stronger
than the actual quest itself,"
said Spielberg. "So we
came up with the father-son
story because the Grail is symbolic
of finding the truth in one's
life - the truth we are always
looking for, consciously or
unconsciously. For me, that
was represented by Indy and
Henry meeting. In this context,
the Grail made sense to me.
They actually go after the Holy
Grail, but their quest is also
symbolic of their search for
each other. Once ? could look
upon the Grail twofold as a
physical antiquity from religious
history and as a symbolic metaphor
for self-illumination, then
it became interesting to me."
The concept of introducing Indy's
father would give a new dimension
to the series and also provide
the emotion missing from the
second film.

After the basic
parameters of the story were
hammered out, Menno Meyjes,
who had worked with Spielberg
on The
Color Purple, wrote the
first draft, which Spielberg
wasn't very fond of. Meyjes
went off to get involved in
another project and the two
filmmakers started looking for
a new scriptwriter. Jeffrey
Boam had impressed Lucas with
his work of Joe Dante's Innerspace
and David Cronenberg's adaptation
of Stephen King's The
Dead Zone and in early
1987 Spielberg called him and
asked him how he would feel
about working on the new Indiana
Jones film. Boam's answer came
as a surprise; "I don't
know why you didn't call me
in on it a long time ago."
The reason Boam felt so sure
was because he had already analyzed
the first two films and felt
he knew what was missing. "For
me the first two movies just
didn't have enough character.
Indiana Jones has always been
a great character but he has
always been this being presented
full-blown with his leather
jacket, hat and bullwhip. I
felt that given the opportunity,
I could bring an added dimension
to the Indy character and basically
get inside him and let the audience
find out how Indiana Jones became
Indiana Jones. With those ideas
in mind I felt ready when George
said, 'Let's sit down and talk
about the story'." When
Boam was brought in he expected
a plot skeleton of some kind
to layer story muscle and tissue
upon. "George Lucas gave
me nothing," was his remark
of his early meeting. "I
was given a laundry list of
elements, we would meet Indy's
father, Sallah and Brody would
return, there would be a female
character to cross swords with
Indy and there would be an adventure.
George told me what he wanted
in the story and then said,
'Give me a story'."

Writer Jeffrey Boam

Soon Boam found
that things weren't as difficult
as he thought. "George
Lucas made a conscious decision
to keep the Indiana Jones films
similar. They're not that open-ended
and I knew going into the project
that I couldn't just do anything
I think I managed it get some
different things in, but I also
know that George vetoed a lot
of my ideas. The Indiana Jones
movies use the cliffhanging
serial as a role model. It's
a unique formula but, bottom
line, it's a formula that means
the writer is faced with a confined
structure and a series of expectations
that need to be met. Fortunately
for everybody involved, this
formula is a highly entertaining
one. The biggest challenge was
making something as exciting
as the first two Raiders
films. Writing sequels is generally
easier than starting from scratch.
But when you've got these two
enormously successful films
in front of you that are considered
classics, you don't want to
be one to drop the ball. Giving
the audience something new was
the real challenge."

Boam and Lucas
created a story where Indy's
father, Henry Jones, professor
of medieval literature spent
his entire life searching for
the Holy Grail. Absorbed by
his search Henry neglected his
son, even when his mother died.
As a result to that the two
drifted apart and hardly spoke
to each other. Twenty-six years
later Indy finds out that his
father has disappeared while
looking for the Grail. He travels
to Europe to find him and the
rest of the story is based on
the conflict between father
and son, and how they blame
each other for mistakes of the
past, while at the end they
become for the first time friends.

One of Boam's
challenges was writing the film's
opening sequence. Actually,
he wrote several openings, but
the consensus was that all of
them were basically empty exercises.
The big problem was that the
teasers in the first two films
always told something new about
Indiana Jones, and what Boam
discovered was that he had nothing
new to say. Finally, Lucas came
up with the idea of seeing Indiana
Jones as a boy and working on
an artifact that would carry
over into the body of the film.
"Nothing traumatic happens.
The sequence doesn't reveal
any terrible dark secrets in
Indy's past. What we will see
is that Indiana Jones, as a
young teen, was always right
on the verge of becoming the
adult he ultimately became.
What we show is that moment
when he became Indiana Jones.
All the elements, his style,
his cloths, it all comes together
in this sequence", explained
Boam. "We find out many
things about Indy's background.
We learn the origin of the bullwhip,
the leather jacket and the hat.
We'll learn where the name Indiana
Jones came from, where he grew
up and what his parents were
like. We also learn how he developed
his fear of snakes. By the time
this film is over, Indiana Jones
won't have too many secrets
left." Spielberg didn't
like the idea of young Indy
at all because he had recently
made Empire
of the Sun, and after
the reviews he received he didn't
want to make any movie with
kids in it. Finally, under the
persuasion of Lucas he agreed.

Another major
problem for Boam was the introduction
of a female character into what
is basically an action-oriented
male adventure without being
contrived. She had to be a challenge
for Indy and, consequently,
as smart and sophisticated as
he is. That led to the creation
of Elsa Schneider, a combination
of Indy's two previous counterparts,
Marion Ravenwood and Willie
Scott. Elsa was determined,
she wasn't afraid to enter a
catacomb with leering skulls
and blackened skeletons and
she managed to maintain her
femininity and sex appeal under
all circumstances. By making
Elsa an art historian, she immediately
became a viable element in the
plot's development and became
involved in an interesting back-and-forth
relationship with Indiana.

One thing Spielberg
definitely wanted was a three-part
test at the end of the film
that Indy had to pass in order
to get to the Grail. "The
nature of the individual tests
was changed several times,"
explained Lucas. "Various
ones were developed in the Menno
Meyjes script. Then we took
a bunch out and later put them
back in. The three tests that
are in the movie now, The Breath
of God, The Word of God and
The Path of God, were essentially
Steven's ideas."

Inspired by the
crusades that took place some
700 years before and the filmmakers'
intention for completing the
trilogy, the completed script
was entitled Indiana
Jones and the Last Crusade
and was much like the first
two Indy films in terms of structure
and formula. It started out
with the tease, which gives
the impression of being the
last few minutes of another
film, and then it flash-forward
to Indiana in his tweeds in
front of his college class.
At this point Indy's father
who is on a quest in Europe
is being introduced. Indy joins
him in his quest, and mixed
in with the usual twist and
double-crosses, it becomes a
metaphor for the father-son
relationship as well as a jumping-off
pint for Indiana Jones' search
for himself. Rising to the high
expectations of Indiana Jones
fans worldwide, the script also
contained an abundance of exotic
locales, action, intrigue and
death-defying stunts.

Once finished
the script was then taken to
Harrison Ford for approval.
Ford felt that many elements
that had made the character
attractive to him and the audience
were missing from the second
film and he was ambitious to
bring them back in the third
one. "When you have done
something two times before the
obligation to the audience is
to provide the best that you
can come up with," was
his opinion. The appearance
of Indy's father would provide
the elements Ford wanted. "In
this film, you see another side
of Indy's personality. These
are men who have never made
any accommodation to each other.
Indy behaves differently in
his father's presence. Who else
would dare call Indy 'junior'?"

Producer Robert Watts

In October 1987
Robert Watts, who would produce
the film, began organizing the
entire production from all aspects
in order to deliver to Spielberg
the wherewithal to tell the
story while the last got fully
involved in the film's pre-production.
Undertaking
Indy III Spielberg had
to abandon two other projects
he was working on at the time.
The one was Rain
Man on which he had spent
half a year developing and the
other was Big.
Barry Levinson was the one who
finally helmed Rain
Man and received an Academy
Award for his work on
the film.

Most of the filmmakers
who worked on the first and
second motion picture adventures
of Indiana Jones reunited to
make Indy's last crusade. They
include cinematographer Douglas
Slocombe, editor Michael Kahn,
production designer Elliot Scott,
costume designer Anthony Powell,
composer John Williams, sound
designer Ben Burtt, special
effects supervisor George Gibbs,
and stunt coordinator Vic Armstrong.

After locations
for filming had been selected,
Spielberg began making storyboards
of his visualization of the
screenplay. Production designer
Elliot Scott used Spielberg's
storyboards as references in
developing the film's sets.
He's main objective with each
setting was to devise the one
that would best enhance the
action of the scene, "The
background to all the films
is logical and realistic. We
go to a great deal of trouble
to make everything as real as
we can, using such details as
authentic Latin inscriptions
on tablets." The use of
storyboards was proven valuable
not only for the film's director
and production designer. "The
storyboards give one time to
fully plan how to achieve certain
effects," said director
of photography Douglas Slocombe,
who was renowned for his use
of lighting to emphasize important
story elements in each frame
of film, so that "one sees
right away what is happening
without any extraneous image."

Three-time Oscar
winning costume designer Anthony
Powell researched extensively
for the creation of 1938s apparel
while Academy
Award-winning special
effects supervisor George Gibbs
began his work on the mechanical
effects by meeting with experts
in the fields of hydraulics,
electronics and engineering
since every day of filming would
involve special effects on two
units. "Special effects
may not always be obvious on
the screen," Gibbs related.
"For example, mechanisms
for props are built by special
effects, from breakaway door
handles to airplane chassis."

Producer Frank
Marshall

"With Raiders
of the Lost Ark we set
a pattern for what these movies
were going to be: action, adventure,
comedy and giant globetrotting
locations," added Frank
Marshall.

At the time of
casting the actor who would
portray Jones Sr. Spielberg
had already the answer, "There
is only one person in the entire
universe who can play Indy's
father, and that's Sean Connery,"
said Spielberg smiling. "Sean
was immediately my first choice.
I never had to think about it,
because the second I thought,
'Who is worthy enough and strong
enough in the area of screen
charisma to be Harrison Ford's
dad?' I ruled out every character
actor that the casting people
gave me. And I immediately went
right to Sean Connery, never
thinking we could get him."
Lucas protested. Following Boam's
image of Jones Sr. he had envisioned
him as a crotchety old man,
just like Henry Fonda's character
in On
Golden Pond and, continuing
his Star
Wars parallel, more Yoda-like.
He had considered several little
known British actors for the
part. He couldn't imagine Connery
as a bookish professor. Jones
Sr. was supposed to be a much
older gentleman, a scholar who
is completely out of his element
in the chaotic world of his
son's adventures. Having Connery
in the role completely altered
the character and unbalanced
the film. Spielberg, although,
insisted because he "wanted
Ford to have a rise to the challenge
of working against a strong
star performer, something that
hadn't been required for him
in the previous two films."

Once Ford was
announced that Sean Connery
was considered for the role
he was pleased, although, he
had some reservations because
Connery was only twelve years
older than he was. Ford was
an admirer of Connery's work.
"When I got to be an actor,
I could see that Sean was one
of the good ones."

Senior and Junior
Jones

When Connery was
offered the role he asked Spielberg
in pure Hollywood fashion, "Is
this Indiana Jones meets James
Bond?" "No",
said Spielberg, "It is
Indiana Jones meets the strongest
father alive!" Connery
liked the idea and agreed to
accept the role if the script
would please him. Once he read
the script he was not only unsatisfied
but also furious, first because
he didn't imagine Henry Jones
as an elderly, gnomish wise
man but astern Victorian patriarch,
a contradictory mixture of action
man and quixotic academic. A
modern version of Sir Richard
Burton, the swashbuckling Victorian
explorer and sensualist who
explored the sources of the
Nile, secretly visited the Muslim
city of Mecca and translated
the Arabian Nights in all it
vampant horniness. Second because
his character appeared in page
seventy of the script. The script
was rewritten, Boam restructured
the character a bit, taking
away some of the crotchety elements
and giving him a bit more vitality.
In the new script Henry Jones
appeared in page fifty, pleasing
Connery, although, it had an
effect on other roles, like
the one of Kazim, the leader
of the Brotherhood sworn to
protect the Grail. "I was
rather disappointed," Connery
explained. "When I voiced
my reservations about it, Steven
was, I think, a bit surprised.
My reservations at the beginning
were mainly to get a clearer
picture of where we were going
with this character, this father
figure. I like the idea of him
being more like Sir Richard
Burton, the explorer: much more
active and academic to begin
with and then you realize what
the genes were that produced
this Indiana Jones. So you get
this picture of the action man
with the academic but still
very much a Victorian father.
And therefore, you could get
a lot of mileage out of the
stunts and still play the father
and be part of the relationship."
When asked about his opinion
about the character of Indy
Connery said, "He's got
skin and that's what I think
captures an audience for this
type of story and that's what
the James Bond films had, too.
Indiana Jones, in some ways,
is a Bondian character because
he always ends up in terrible
situations, which always have
to resolved with some invention
or humorous action. That's the
only solution he ever has whether
it's jumping into a plane and
says he's can fly it but he
doesn't know how to land it.
Yes, he's very Bondian."
To please Connery, even more,
Boam created a competitive relationship
between father and son by having
them both bed the same woman.
If Henry Jones was to be portrait
by any other actor it would
have been silly, but with Sean
Connery in the part things were
different. Tom Stoppard was
also called in to beef up the
character. Uncredited he wrote
the scenes in which Indy taxes
his father with having abandoned
him as a boy to go off on his
own adventures.

Connery contributed
to the script's rewriting making
it more fun. "I always
try to find the comedy in everything,
because it's much more revealing,
much more enjoyable and harder.
There is something quite comedic
and absurd about somebody sitting
in that sidecar! What we really
got down to in the Last
Crusade was trying to
find as many places as possible
where they would have problems
relating to each other, which
always lends itself to the comedic
elements. Right from the very
beginning Henry calls Indy 'junior!'"

Since Connery
signed for the role, Lucas presented
to Paramount
a budget of $ 44 million and
a schedule same as before while
less than 20% of the cost would
be given to the actors. The
studio bulked, at first, but
finally they agreed.

With the writing
process left behind Boam said
about his collaboration with
Lucas and Spielberg, "George
Lucas and Steven Spielberg have
created a new genre out of a
very old one. George has the
mind of a writer and understands
instantly when an idea is right
or wrong and how it affects
the plot. George and I would
paint in broad strokes and Steven
was great in coming up with
how to embellish them."

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